This past week I caught a portion of a radio interview with Arthur Alexander, an economist at Georgetown University, who stated that Japan will recover quickly from the recent devastating earthquake and tsunami. The reason, he said, is because Japan has three things that are built into advanced modern economies: Redundancy, Resilience, and Robustness. As Susan and I rode down the highway, we reflected on how important these three R’s are for success in any organization.
Redundancy
We usually think of a redundancy as something that is superfluous or unnecessary. In fact, the first definition in Dictionary.com supports that concept: “superfluous repetition or overlapping.” Look farther down, however, and see another meaning: “the provision of additional or duplicate systems, equipment, etc., that function in case an operating part or system fails, as in a spacecraft.” Redundancy, in this light, is preparing for an emergency to ensure the seamless continuation of production even if essential parts or players are unexpectedly removed.
Many businesses do themselves a huge disfavor by trying to avoid redundancies in an effort to reduce operating costs and increase profit margins. Whenever a major merger takes place, for example, redundant jobs are eliminated in an effort to streamline personnel costs. In difficult economic times, tenured workers (who, admittedly, usually have higher salaries and benefits) are offered early retirement incentives without taking into consideration the brain trust of experience they represent and without making sure someone else knows everything they knew before they leave. When the only person who knows how to do the job is suddenly unavailable, momentum is lost or production in that area comes to a screeching halt until the person returns or someone new learns to do the job.
Redundancy in your business or organization is not just a matter of having two people who do the same job. It is more a matter of contingency preparation. Redundancy might include such things as mentoring and preparing young leaders for succession. It could also be something as simple as keeping good backups of your essential files and correspondence. Redundancy, as Dr. Alexander pointed out, can be a good thing.
Resilience
Again, Dictionary.com comes to our aid in defining resilience:
“1. the power or ability to return to the original form, position, etc., after being bent, compressed, or stretched; elasticity.
2. ability to recover readily from illness, depression, adversity, or the like; buoyancy.”
The opposite of resilience is resistance or rigidity. When managers take an attitude of “ours is not to reason why, ours is but to do and die,” they usually lead people on a destructive path of resistance or resignation. (These are two R’s you probably would want to avoid!)
Resilience is the ability to deal with unexpected change and adapt to the new reality. You build resilience by introducing change in increments and developing an ethos of embracing change for the better. In resilient organizations, frontline workers actually will introduce needed change.
Robustness
Robustness is associated with good health. Dictionary.com, what do you say? “Strong and healthy; hardy; vigorous.”
A robust organization will not suffer from a prolonged depressed morale. Even robust organizations will have setbacks when crises hit. The difference is, a robust organization will have built the resilience needed to recover and bounce back quickly. A sick organization, on the other hand, will have built up more resistance and rigidity that ultimately leads to another “R”: Rigor mortis.
To have a healthy and hardy organization, you need healthy and hardy personnel. Robustness is not only related to physical well-being. It also assumes emotional, spiritual, and psychological health. To be robust, the organization needs to build an ethos of its members caring for each other. That means coworkers looking out for each other. It also means supervisors taking a genuine interest in the welfare of their personnel. People throughout a robust organization will demonstrate their confidence that they are regarded as more than just expendable resources.
Hint to the Leader
Regardless of your position, you can help develop redundancy, resilience and robustness in the people who look to you for leadership. What can you do right now to start building the three R’s into your organization?
Hint to the Follower
The difference between building resistance or resilience starts with a personal decision. Decide right now to be part of the solution and not part of the problem. Look for ways to make things better and find an appropriate way to share your thoughts with others.
© Copyright Dr. Larry Gay, March 2011
"Lessons on Leadership and Followership"
